Ritual apologies for taking so long between posts this time. But lately, however, the combination of rampant, surreal domestic political farce and numerous concurrent problematic international situations has pushed the demand for my advice through the roof. For the last three weeks, a constant stream of Washington insiders and foreign dignitaries has been running to my office with their hair on fire, beseeching me for solutions to their apparently monumental and seemingly insoluble predicaments. Gretchen and I have been putting in twelve and fourteen hour days, and, as is sometimes necessary, have added Saturdays to the appointment schedule.
As if that weren’t enough, two weeks ago Cerise got rear-ended around half past midnight on the Whitehurst Freeway at high speed by an undocumented alien operating an unregistered, uninsured vehicle without a driver’s license. He blew 0.38 on the breathalyzer and a dump of his smart phone (which, by the way, was later found to be stolen) showed he had also been texting at the time. Turns out he was an Uber driver on his way to pick up some passengers at a bar on M Street. This being DC, of course, he was out on bail posted by a local Hispanic aid organization the next day and has since vanished. In addition, there seems to be some doubt as to whether Jesus el Pifco, as it appears on his arrest report, is his real name. Anyway, meanwhile, whatever spare time I could manage to garner was spent sitting up with Cerise in her room at Georgetown University Hospital, trading vigil shifts with her relatives. She was finally released to go home on Thursday, though, and the family has arranged for nursing services there, so now, at last, I have some time to update my blog.
My ten o’clock consultation yesterday was with Austin Houston Crockett Bowie Bonham III, and I must say, he really outdid himself infuriating Gretchen this time. I wasn’t in the reception area when it happened, of course – I was in my office advising an Estonian diplomat about Putin’s massive troop build-up on the Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian borders, the NATO reinforcements sent to counterbalance it, and what those three frightened little nations should do if the US Navy gets trigger happy and shoots down one of those Russian fighter jets that have been buzzing American warships in the Baltic Sea.
And furthermore, as the Fates would have it, there was nobody but Austin and Gretchen in the other room. Exactly what it was that transpired depended on who the DC Police asked after Gretchen dialed 911 and they showed up – in less than five minutes, which I must say was pretty impressive and quite unexpected on my part. They usually take considerably longer.
Gretchen told the cops that Austin had put his hands somewhat south of her décolleté, achieving what all lusty, baseball-loving Americans know as a second-base run. Austin claimed he was simply reaching over her shoulder to pick up a pen lying on her desk so he could write his hotel room and phone number on a Post-it note. Gretchen responded by asking Austin to explain to the nice policemen why, if that were the case, he was standing behind her instead of in front of the desk, where clients such as he rightfully belong. Austin replied that the situation was, naturally, a result of him having dropped an eighty-five dollar cigar, which had fallen from his suit jacket pocket when he removed his wallet and rolled under her desk, coming to rest next to the wall behind her chair. After that, before Gretchen could begin her rebuttal questioning, Austin gasped in horror, telling the cops that darn it all, he apparently had lost two one-hundred dollar bills somewhere on the floor, too, and could they help him find them? While, after a quick search, neither cop announced discovering anything, their visit nevertheless came to an abrupt end when their radios crackled with an urgent summons to another nearby incident involving a suspicious package of possibly terrorist origin.
“Now check and see,” Austin cackled as he loped into my office and stretched his lanky Texan frame on the couch in front of the picture window overlooking the White House, “if your girl turns in that third hundred dollar bill I left out there after the cops went away – or if she keeps it for herself.”
“I’m absolutely sure she’ll turn it in to me as lost property at the end of the day,” I told him. “And by the way, Gretchen is my private secretary, Austin, not my ‘girl,’ as you so quaintly put it.”
“Think I’m getting’ through to her?” he inquired. “Looks to me like I’m makin’ some kinda progress.”
“Unfortunately,” I warned, “the only kind of progress you’re making with Gretchen is toward a place on the Telephone Consultation Only List. Now, please, Austin, stop tormenting her with your amorous overtures, because next time, instead of the police, she might just call your wife. And if that happens, I think your Missus is going to be less interested in helping you look for lost C-notes under the furniture and more interested in depriving me of one my more colorful clients.”
Austin blanched briefly. “You mean that… that… employee of yours would call my wife?”
“She might,” I allowed.
“And you wouldn’t fire her for it?” he demanded.
“I can’t,” I said. “If I did, under the laws of the District of Columbia, she could sue me – big time.”
“Damn!” he spat, taking out an Arturo Fuente Opus X / A, biting off the end and lighting it up with a Texas size flame. “See? That’s what happens when you let liberals take over the government! And you know what? That’s a very fittin’ co-inky-dink right there, good buddy, ’cause you know why I came up here to Yankee-Land this week? To do somethin’ about the latest example of all this politically-correct bull-[expletive] the [expletive] liberals been flingin’ around like it’s some kind of commie egg-head chip-tossin’ contest!”
“And to exactly which commie egg-head bull chip toss are you referring?” I inquired.
“This here commie egg-head bull-[expletive] about men in dresses who think they’re women goin’ in the restroom with little girls!” he roared. “Jesus H. Christ on a crutch, Tom! Has this here so-called United States of America gone completely [expletive] crazy or somethin’? What’s the hell’s the matter with everybody? First they make pot legal in Colorado, and now they think it’s okay for men to decide they want to be women and then let them use the ladies’ [expletive] bathroom! What next? They gonna let them [expletive] perverts smoke that [expletive] whacky-weed in the ladies’ room, too?”
“Well,” I averred, “at the moment, here in these so-called United States of America, we have an incompetent crypto-lesbian feminazi blowhard contending with a fuzzy-headed self-proclaimed Democratic Socialist for the privilege of running for President against a bloviating maniac billionaire who wants become America’s first Great Dictator, with only a completely loathsome, utterly repellent, politically demented Canadian Hispanic Harvard boy offering a reasonable hope of stopping him. And as of the Indiana Republican Primary this Tuesday, the completely loathsome, utterly repellent, politically demented Canadian Hispanic Harvard boy has given up and run away with his tail between his legs, with his wife ineffectively denying that he is the Zodiac Killer. So frankly, at this point, good buddy, nothing on God’s green earth could happen that would surprise me in the least.”
“Say what you want about Ted Cruz,” Austin shot back, puffing a big red cherry of indignant outrage on the tip of his cigar as he spoke, “at least he had the cojones to speak up against all this transgender bathroom insanity, which is more than you can say for Donald J. Trump!”
“Trump’s a businessman,” I pointed out with a shrug. “As far as he’s concerned, a she-male’s money is as green as anybody else’s, so let them use any friggin’ bathroom they want, as long as they spend some bucks in the casino.”
“Damn it,” Austin roared, “there’s some stuff more important than money, ya know.”
“It’s a good thing,” I noted, “I just told you that, at this point, nothing could possibly surprise me, because otherwise I might be absolutely astounded at the notion of you saying what I think I just heard. But really, pray tell, Austin, what about this transgender bathroom thing is more important to you than mere, filthy lucre?”
“People goin’ to the bathroom where the Lord God Almighty don’t intend them to do their business!” Austin barked. “I go to church, Collins! I read the Good Book! Maybe not every day, like some folks, but I do read it! And I take what I see there seriously! So I know a few things about what God likes and what He don’t – what makes Him mad and what He don’t mind much about. You can cheat suckers outta their last [expletive] dime, for instance, and that’s okay with Him. You can work wetbacks to death in the broilin’ sun, and He’s totally jake with that, no problem. We killed off the Indians like they was barnyard fleas and we was the guy from Terminix, didn’t we? And did the Lord strike America down for that? Not just no – hell no, He lifted us up, made us the most powerful nation the world has ever known! We whupped the [expletive] ’till their black backs was mountains of scars and we made ’em pick that East Texas cotton ’till their fingers bled, but did God Almighty smite us with lightnin’ bolts from up above? Nope, He did not. And you know why? Because there’s plenty of slaves and death and people cheatin’ to win in the Bible, that’s why! God Almighty is totally fine with that stuff, Collins! What [expletive] Him off is [expletives] in dresses who think they’re women makin’ Number One and Number Two in the [expletive] ladies’ room! And it ain’t no [expletive] surprise, neither, because it says, right there in the Bible, that men are men and women are women, because that’s the way God made us and we’re in His image and when we desecrate that by goin’ potty in the wrong place, then, mark my words, Collins – then we are in for some really deep [expletive], because then, we have [expletive] off the Creator and Ruler of the whole [expletive] universe!”
“So,” I inquired, “in that case, what’s your take on these conservative organizations that are sending volunteer male members into the ladies’ rooms in states that allow LGBTQ individuals to use the restrooms with which they have gender identification, regardless of what their DNA or birth certificates say?”
“LGBTQ?” Austin sneered. “What’s that, some kind of sandwich?”
“Some might say so,” I allowed. “Served with KY Jelly instead of mayonnaise, I suppose. But what about the conservative sit-ins? Given what you just told me about how angry God gets when a man goes into the ladies’ room, do you think He would make an exception if that man was a conservative who went in there to take a dump or drain the vein in order to make a political and moral statement?”
When pressed on the point, Austin clearly became taken aback. He paused, contemplating the ceiling and blowing smoke rings for about two minutes. “You know,” he said at last, “that’s a damn good question. And come to think of it, since God knows what’s in everyone’s heart, I reckon He would know that conservative feller there, goin’ into that ladies’ room to do his business is only doin’ that ’cause he’s tryin’ to stop the perverts from doin’ it too, and the Lord would forgive him.”
“But not the perverts?” I sought to confirm.
“Absolutely not,” Austin confidently proclaimed, “no way. God’s gonna send all of them straight to Hell. It’s just that simple. They’re all gonna burn in a lake a fire forever, just like the Jews and the Muslims and the Hindus and Buddhists and the Unitarians and the Catholics. No offense.”
“None taken. But what if the nice Christian conservative man decides to protest the transgender ladies’ restroom by going into it wearing a dress?” I asked.
“What!” Austin gasped. “Who the hell would do that?”
“J. Edgar Hoover might,” I suggested, “if he was still alive, that is.”
“Well, uh… if… that is,” Austin stammered, “ah… okay, if the Christian conservative was J. Edgar Hoover, if he was still alive, that is, and he’s in the FBI, right? So in that case, if the dress is a disguise or something, meant to fool the perverts in a sting operation or whatever, then God would say it’s okay. But if that man was wearing a dress because he felt like a woman, then I don’t care if he’s in the FBI or not, he’s a pervert using the ladies’ room, just like the other perverts do, and sayin’ he’s goin’ in there to protest all that perversion ain’t gonna fool the Lord none whatsoever!”
“How about conservative women going into the men’s room to protest transgender identity politics?” I pressed. “Don’t forget – women wear pants as well as dresses, so a conservative woman protester could go into a transgender men’s room wearing them and it wouldn’t be obvious whether she was a sincere Christian doing the Lord’s work or some kind of bizarre female pervert who feels like she’s really a man.”
“Yeah,” Austin reluctantly conceded, “only God could be sure about what was goin’ on in a situation like that.”
“And no doubt even He wouldn’t be entirely certain. So what can I do for you?” I dryly inquired.
“Damn it all, Collins,” Austin fretted, puffing mightily on his expensive stogie, “Them bacon, lettuce, tomato gay and queer sandwich [expletives] just been playin’ tit-for-tat with us! We get a law passed tellin’ em’ to use the bathroom for the sex it says on their birth certificate and they get big-time organizations like the NCAA to threaten to boycott the states with laws like that. We threaten to boycott Target stores for having transgender bathrooms, they go and get every pervert in the state to shop there! We picket transgender bathrooms, they picket the statehouse! We send moral Christian men into the ladies’ room to monitor for male perverts in dresses after little girls, and they send bull dykes into the men’s room and dare us to do something about it! The whole [expletive] thing’s come down to a [expletive] Mexican stand-off! What can my side do to get the upper hand?”
“Well,” I began, “no doubt the Missus drags you to church every Sunday?”
“Sure does,” he ruefully attested. “Which is one good reason for me comin’ up here to Washington once in a while. I can do good work for the conservative cause, stay up late as I want on Saturday night and also get to sleep as late as I want in my hotel room the next morning.”
“So when you attend church on Sunday with your wife,” I continued, “do you notice if your fellow congregants have any young children?”
“Oh, hell yeah,” he nodded, leaning back to take another puff off his cigar, “Bein’ Southern Baptists and all, most of ’em don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t dance, don’t go to movies, don’t do much of anything.”
“Not like you,” I observed.
“My wife was raised a Southern Baptist,” Austin clarified. “Not me. But most of the folks in her church, when you get right down to it, there ain’t much for them to do but read the Bible, eat fried chicken and barbeque, peep out their windows to check up on their neighbors, gossip about what they done seen and then hop in the bed and make more Southern Baptists. No doubt about it, them folks take the Lord’s command to go forth and multiply mighty seriously.”
“So there are plenty of babies in the congregation?” I sought to confirm.
“[Expletive] loads of them,” he told me with a distinct wince.
“Plenty of two-year olds, also, then, no doubt?” I pressed.
“Yeah, yeah,” he groused, “little rug rats and ankle biters all over the place. What are you getting’ at?”
“Have any really… colicky babies?” I asked. “You know, the kind that won’t stop crying, no matter what?”
“We have a nursery in the church basement,” Austin revealed. “Run by a couple of deaf old grannies what dotes on kids no matter what kinda hellion they are. And if a kid starts makin’ a ruckus, then down in the basement they go with the deaf old grannies until the service and the church social are over.”
“Okay then,” I told him. “In that case, you’re all set. Right there in your church basement, and in thousands of other conservative Christian church basements across the nation every Sunday, there are thousands of colicky babies and screaming two-year olds.”
“Yeah,” Austin agreed with a mystified expression. “So?”
“So get them out of those basement nurseries and into the transgender bathrooms,” I explained. “Put together a network of Christian Web sites and Moral Majority smart phone apps to coordinate the occupation. Organize it so that every transgender bathroom in the nation has a devout Christian with a colicky, crying baby and a tantrum-prone screaming two year old in it, during all bathroom operating hours, or if need be, twenty-four seven.”
“Three-sixty-five?” Austin added.
“Believe me,” I assured him, “you do this right, and it won’t even take a year.”
Austin furrowed his brow in thought for a moment. “You know somebody who can do all that Web site and smart phone app [expletive]?”
“My nephew Jason could probably take care of that for you,” I assured him. “If not, then my brother Rob Roy could recommend someone.”
“Okay, good buddy,” Austin declared as he rubbed out the stub of his cigar in the oversized carved kingfisher Burmese jade ashtray on the coffee table and strode over to my desk. “I get it. A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind [expletive] bat, huh? You’re a genius, as usual.”
“Thanks,” I modestly acknowledged. “Now, may I ask a small favor?”
“Sure, sure,” Austin enthusiastically beamed. “What is it?”
“Please,” I requested, “keep your hands off Gretchen when you leave.”